Dr. Austin O'Carroll:

I do not know the exact costs for testing. All these tests cost money. We are always balancing the cost of testing for hepatitis C against the cost of treating a patient. The problem is that if people are not tested and cases are not picked up, firstly, those people will go on to develop cirrhosis, which is incredibly expensive to treat. Liver transplants are phenomenally expensive. Secondly, those people are likely to become spreaders of hepatitis C. There is a cost involved in testing. I do not know the exact cost, but it is not a particularly expensive test. The costs of not testing are significant.